Ecstatic? Outraged? Either way, it’s happening.
In an exclusive interview with Steven Horowitz for Billboard.biz, Jomo & Barry Hankerson–the co-owners of Blackground Records (Jomo is Aaliyah’s cousin)–confirmed that a new Aaliyah album is on the way, due out later in 2012.
From Billboard.biz:
Using 16 unreleased songs and “fragments” from Aaliyah’s archive, Blackground hopes to release the LP by year’s end, enlisting “contemporary artists” to color the project and help repackage her vocals.
Confirming the rumor that broke earlier this week, the Blackground Records execs also revealed that Drake, along with “Enough Said” producer Noah “40” Shebib, will be co-executive producing the project.
Oh yes, and Timbaland and Missy Elliott are on board, too.
While the album is in the early stages, Hankerson confirms that Timbaland and Missy Elliott will participate in assembling the LP. “Timbaland will be involved with this project. One of the records that we had that was never released was a Missy record that we obviously are going to be refreshing,” says Hankerson, who did not clarify if Timbaland has already produced songs for the project.
And as for why the record is coming out just now, a full decade after her last posthumous collection, I Care 4 U?
“We really felt like it was time. There’s a real new generation that doesn’t know her necessarily, and we wanted to continue her musical legacy with this new generation,” explains Hankerson. “That’s one of the reasons why we wanted to do very contemporary music. We didn’t want to make it a nostalgic project; we already did that with the I Care 4 U album. The idea was to release new music for her diehard fans, and also reintroduce her music to a new generation that doesn’t really understand how much influence she has in the music that they’re listening to today.”
For all the details, check out the full interview over at Billboard.biz.
Aaliyah forever.